The present invention relates to a drive system, more specifically relates to a drive system which is capable of moving a plurality of moving bodies.
Conventionally, many types of drive systems have existed. Some of them were disclosed in Japanese Patent Kokai No. 63-191533, U.S. Pat. No. 2,857,032, No. 3,422,538 and No. 4,171,657, German Patent No. DE-36 28 202A, and European Patent No. EP-265-855-A. All of them are capable of moving one moving body to discretionary positions in a plane. Tools for machining, instruments for inspection or measurement, work to be machined, robot-heads, etc. can be attached to the moving body and are moved to prescribed positions for machining, etc.
Those conventional drive systems, however, have the following disadvantages.
A plurality of, for example, tools cannot be independently moved because each conventional drive system has only one moving body.
In the case of moving a tool attached to a moving body along the locus shown in FIG. 12, a control program of a computer for controlling the movement of the moving body must be very complex and difficult to write. Further, the computer must have large memory capacity because of a complex program, so that drive systems must be very expensive.